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Every Day

Review

Immediately I have to figure out who I am. It’s not just the body – opening my eyes and discovering whether the skin on my arm is light or dark, whether my hair is long or short, whether I’m fat or thin, boy or girl, scarred or smooth. The body is the easiest thing to adjust to, if you’re used to waking up in a new one each morning. It’s the life, the context of the body, that can be hard to grasp. Every day I am someone else. I am myself – I know I am myself – but I am also someone else.

It has always been like this.

"Author David Levithan presents a unique and often sophisticated premise in EVERY DAY. Love is a complex idea in and of itself, but when you compound it with the very idea of someone physically changing on a day-to-day basis, it makes you wonder what the impetus of love is."

A wakes up every day as someone new. It is always in the body of someone around his age, about 16, and usually is in the same area as the last. A has seen it all. He has inhabited the bodies of kids in great families, in horrible families, in healthy kids, in sick kids, and so forth. A tries hard not to mess around with the many lives he inhabits, but decides to make an exception one day after waking up in the body of a boy named Justin and meeting a girl named Rhiannon.

Normally A wouldn’t do anything too far out of Justin’s character, but there is something exceptional about Rhiannon --- the way she laughs, her hidden beauty, and hopefully her understanding mind. So A decides to take a chance and be who he is: the real A. After an amazing day, waking up in the body of yet another new person, A decides to keep in contact with Rhiannon no matter who he happens to be. A has always been careful to avoid doing this, yet he can’t help but yearn after a normal life that he has never had.

At first, Rhiannon thinks that someone is playing a prank on her after A shows up as different boys and girls in different bodies, but once she realizes that he is the same person in each of them, she decides to take a chance. But can she overcome the physical barrier of a new person every day, even though A swears that they are supposed to be together? The true nature of love is called into question in this supernatural love story that asks: Can you love someone who is destined to change every day?

Author David Levithan presents a unique and often sophisticated premise in EVERY DAY. Love is a complex idea in and of itself, but when you compound it with the very idea of someone physically changing on a day-to-day basis, it makes you wonder what the impetus of love is. Can it be as simple as falling in love with someone’s personality only, or does the physical play an important role as well? This idea and more are explored in this fascinating tale, and ultimately the answer Levithan provides is one that is both satisfying and enlightening.